Education in the First State
May 27, 2015

Celebrating the Good News about Delaware Public Schools

 

All over the state, Delaware students, teachers, principals and parents are working together to ensure that students are prepared for college and careers after high school. The goal of this newsletter, Take Note: Education in the First State, is to highlight success and progress toward that goal. We welcome your suggestions for examples of the great work our educators, students and parents are doing that should be celebrated. Please send your ideas for stories that should be included here to: [email protected].

 

Also, please pass this along to other interested friends and family members.


 

Active Advanced Placement Learning


Award-winning science teacher Michael Kaufmann of Brandywine School District's Concord High School lets his Advanced Placement Biology students choose their own activities, lab assignments and research projects, which makes for a lot of movement as this 19-second video summary of a full day of AP classes illustrates. "Students enter the classroom today with a large diversity of learning levels and attention spans," Mr. Kauffman writes on his website. "These students are accustomed to instant access to information ... , they no longer require the teacher or the textbook to be the sole source of information." Mr. Kaufmann's first AP Biology class at Concord in 2002 had eight students; five took the AP exam, and four passed. Then, the school switched the focus of its AP science program: The school now encourages all AP students to take the exams so that they learn from the experience. The result? Big jumps in the number of students enrolling in the classes, taking the exams and passing. This year, 62 students are taking AP Biology, and 77 students are signed up for next year. In an understatement, Mr. Kaufmann said, "This is quite an improvement from the four who passed back in 2002."

 

Growth like that contributed to significant gains in AP test taking and passing statewide over the past few years. 

Superstars in Education

Watch and listen to teachers, principals and students talk about the six winners of the Delaware Chamber of Commerce's 2015 Superstars in Education awards.

 

One of the awards went to the Teaching Excellence Framework that is being used for coaching teachers at four public charter schools, including EastSide Charter School in Wilmington. Sonya Sheppard, a 3rd grade science and social studies teacher at EastSide, says she appreciates that the framework is helping her continue her professional growth. Teaching, she says, has undergone a dramatic change during her 12 years in the classroom: "We've gone from teaching skills in isolation to really integrating (skills) and not just throwing stuff at students for them to absorb, shifting toward teaching them how to be better thinkers."

Getting Credit for Learning

Doing well on Smarter Balanced Assessments will exempt students from remedial classes at Delaware colleges.

 

Delaware high school students who eventually go on to one of five colleges in the state after they graduate may not have to take a placement test to get out of remedial college classes that don't count toward graduation. The colleges have agreed to accept the Smarter Balanced Assessments in English language arts and mathematics that students are taking this spring as a substitute, if they do well and meet certain other conditions. The colleges say the Smarter Balanced Assessments will provide them with evidence of whether students are ready for college-level work. Find out more about this important step forward for Delaware students
Student Spotlight

Identically Accomplished

From left, Brandywine School District Board Members Ralph Ackerman and Joseph Brumskill, Colin Michels, Connor Michels, Superintendent Mark Holodick, Assistant Superintendent Lincoln Hohler, and Principal James Simmons


 

Connor and Colin Michels of Wilmington are identical twins and, as twins, they have a lot in common. They are each graduating from Brandywine High School this spring with a 4.9671 grade point average because they did well in the same Advanced Placement classes. They participated in the same clubs related to technology, mathematics, Spanish and academics and played the same sports. And they both were among the 81 outstanding Delaware students honored as 2015 Secretary of Education Scholars. "We're very privileged to have parents who really stress education," Connor says. Their parents, Fred and Ann Michels of Wilmington, are both engineers, and Connor and Colin intend to major in engineering at Texas A&M University, where they will enroll in the fall. Their grade point averages made them the school's co-valedictorians. "The reason we are co-valedictorians is because we're so competitive with each other," Connor says. "If one gets a 97 and the other gets a 94, there's a lot of trash-talking. But it's friendly competition." The twins describe themselves as "outgoing and enthusiastic and friendly" and proud of their high school. One difference between them: Colin was president of the Student Council and Connor was vice president. They flipped a coin to decide who would run for which office.

Teacher Spotlight

Traveling to the Arctic to Benefit Her Students

Teagan Thomas with two of her science students

 

This summer, Teagan Thomas, a 6th grade science teacher and instructional leader at Las Americas ASPIRA Academy public charter school in Newark, will be traveling by ship to the Arctic Sea to research wildlife and climate, develop activities for use in her classroom and have the adventure of a lifetime. She's heading north because the National Geographic Society chose her as a 2015 Grosvenor Teacher Fellow. Only in her second year as a teacher, Ms. Thomas participated in the Delaware Department of Education's NextGen Teacher Leader program this school year and is helping her colleagues use the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). She says that serving as a teacher leader emboldened her to apply for the fellowship. "My involvement with NGSS has changed me personally, opening my eyes to how science should be taught, explored and appreciated," she says. Read what other NextGen teacher leaders have to say about the teacher leader program here
Data Point

On Teacher Leadership

 

Teacher leaders such as Ms. Teagan are serving in a variety of roles in addition to their classroom duties, and educators are noticing. In a 2013 statewide survey, 84 percent of the respondents reported that "teachers are encouraged to participate in school leadership roles." Find out some of the ways they are involved as leaders here.

Pathways to Prosperity


Preparing Delaware Students for High-Demand Careers

 

Fifteen Delaware high schools will start new programs in high-demand fields such as biomedical science, engineering, computer science, culinary arts and hospitality management this fall. "This is an incredible opportunity, and it fits really, really well with the changing needs of our employers," Governor Jack Markell said in announcing the new programs. "I just think it's incredibly important for the students in particular to understand this changing job market -- this is no rhetoric and this is not some kind of theory -- this is what's going on all around us."


 

Here are the schools that received grants and the programs they are developing:

 

School
Program

Appoquinimink High School

Computer Science and Engineering

Brandywine High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Caesar Rodney High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Glasgow High School

Biomedical Sciences

Laurel High School

Biomedical Sciences and Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

McKean High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Middletown High School

Engineering

Mount Pleasant High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Newark Charter High School

Computer Science and Engineering

Paul M. Hodgson Vo-Tech High School

Engineering

Polytech High School

Engineering

Seaford High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Smyrna High School

Engineering

Sussex Academy

Engineering 

William Penn High School

Culinary Arts & Hospitality Management

Other Good News in Delaware's Public Schools

 

Red Clay Teacher Named 2015 History Teacher of the Year for Delaware

 

Three Delaware Schools Honored for Going Green

 

Every College-Ready Student in Delaware's 2015 Graduating Class Applies for Postsecondary Learning Opportunities

 

Delaware Educators Celebrate the Transformation of Student Learning

 

News Journal Editors: Delaware Students, Teachers Piling up Big Wins

 

The newspaper says increases in Advanced Placement test-taking, the help the state provides to students in applying to college and grants to 15 high schools to create new career preparation programs add up to strong progress in the state.